Husband, Father, Lover
by Tsinoitulover
Summary: "It was times like these when the familiar, twisted feeling of something whispered tucked away into his soul—regret—but he hushes it, gently wraps it up so that it doesn't break, and then lets it fall forever away and away into a hole with no end."
1. The Fall

**Warnings:** Rated for the use of coarse language (in the second and third entries); also, the third entry, "Starlight", is heavily dolloped with a side of Kirk/McCoy.

**Disclaimer:** Star Trek is not mine.

* * *

The Fall

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Precipice

He misses her first three birthdays.

During the fourth, there's a sharp stab right through his chest when the toddler pinpoints him with a direct look, her eyes quizzical and pondering like she was trying to make sense of something wholly odd. It passes, a brief second, in favor of the pretty cake that her mommy had set out on the table.

It's a vanilla cake with a creamy peach filling, Joanna's fruit of choice.

_"It's her favorite."_

Leonard just found out today.

It was times like these when the familiar, twisted feeling of something whispered tucked away into his soul—_regret_—but he hushes it, gently wraps it up so that it doesn't break, and then lets it fall forever away and away into a hole with no end. His own face feels unfamiliar as a smile wobbles onto it when his daughter laughs delightfully and turns to him—big, bright hazel eyes—_just like her Daddy's_—and smears cake icing all over his nose and cheeks.

There's the faint quiver of a light and Leonard just catches sight of Joceyln at the other end of the table lowering the old holovid recorder, dust still coating more obscure crevices where hands didn't quite touch. Her smile is like his, foreign and shaky like ripples on water that don't quite reach the startling, pretty blue of her eyes. _Like the sky._

She places the recorder on the table end with no overt rush, their eyes still lingering at each other—trying to pull something out of each other—the din of Joanna's laughter strangely echoing faraway, her tiny hands still swiping at Leonard's face.

She stands there with slack arms at her sides, the space and air around her ringing with a dull, pulsing emptiness that distorts her and makes her seem like a small, willowy figure at the end of a vast, grassy field that had once been something else.

_I love you._

Unbidden, his hand starts to rise as if it were floating upwards on slow water and then the tide stops, and his hand shudders once into an awkward, beckoning position that is half unsure with the intent of grasping or simply hanging limply from cut marionette strings.

His view is smudged with the sugary grease of icing and through white splotches he blurrily sees the image of the small figure ripple and disappear.

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Hold

He wants her to be happy.

She tearfully hugs him on the campus green, her eyes shimmering like crystal drops of a sunny sky, and her smile is wide and true.

_I'm so proud of you._

He is the youngest, absolutely youngest, to be accepted into such a prestigious program. He has surpassed his peers, leaving them spinning in his magnificent wake. He is on the fast track to his future and she is by his side.

He wants her to be happy.

_Where are you?_

Her family sneers at her behind her back, the Treadways are even worse. But it lessens each time his name shows up in the headlines, his hands busy holding a shiny plaque or shaking one of some important person.

_Where are you?_

He searches for the perfect house, pulls all the strings he has, works overtime night after night until his work and study hours blend together permanently. He sweats and bleeds and claims more headlines. He pushes for a lower down payment. He struggles and struggles because she deserves the very best—not a second rate anything, including a ring. He pushes himself harder despite the cracks that start to weave through him like slick spider webs.

_Where are you?_

But he falls to his knees—both, not one—because she is not there. She is gone.

_Where are you?_

Then she is suddenly standing-collapsing-at the back porch door, breathless, eyes like crying glass, her hands grasping the edges of the doorway, knees wobbling at the threshold.

_"I'm pregnant."_

He wants her to be happy.

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Forever

He is twenty-one and she is eighteen.

They're in love.

They will tell their children that they were each other's first sweethearts. And that their mama snagged the most handsome gentleman at the dance all to herself. And their daddy will tell them that his heart was utterly and completely stolen by an angel, golden halo for hair, who flew to him and took his hand. They will tell them that their mama followed daddy where ever he led because, together, they held the miracle of flight.

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Never

She grabs his hand, snatching it from his own body, ripping him across to the checkered floor of too few bodies and too bright spot lights. She jerks to a stop and whips around, her hand still firmly grasped on his.

His eyes are wide and astonished. Frozen by the stormy intensity of hers.

But, slowly, bit by bit, his hand holds hers too.

He would do.

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Dream

It was all that he ever wanted to do in life, from the cradle and onward he never remembered a time any different from when he wanted to become a doctor. He is bright and young and doors are opening for him like bird's wings gently flapping in the breeze.

It defines him.

He knows that he can make it if he keeps going, keeps climbing, never stopping. Firm and steady on the mountain road where the sun is a pure white and radiant beacon at the very tip top, lighting the way to it.

It was all that she could do but be dazzled by this secret side to the shy but handsome boy whose entire being, she would swear it on her soul, would burst with the biggest smile she ever saw whenever he talked about his one dream.

Then she ached. She wanted to take and hold his strong, sure, kind hands and walk beside him on his glorious mountain road where a luminous future awaited.

So she did.

_"Will you dance with me?"_

_"My darling, until the end of time."_


	2. Daddy's Girl

Daddy's Girl

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Absence

They say that she is her father's child, through and through.

Her hair is thick and rich mahogany, but it's her eyes that make both of them shake inwardly for different reasons. They are hazel, not quite green, not quite brown, but somewhere right in the middle.

_It's her birthday._

The bills are dutifully paid every month, and Jocelyn doesn't even look at the small table by her side of the bed; she only reaches out with a hand and feels the familiar casing of the credit chip that is there without fail. She has stopped looking over to the left at the smooth, crisp sheets for a while now, and, instead, she simply rises and tidies her half of the bed so that it becomes complete.

The front door quietly opens and clicks closed and the couch sags with a sigh. She comes down the stairs to the see the most curious picture of her daughter pausing in mid-play with her dolls in order to stare at an equally flummoxed man on the couch.

Joanna blinks and tilts her head to the side, the man unknowingly acting as her mirror.

_"...Daddy?"_

It is a question. A true, pure question and neither knows from which of them the choked sound came from.

But it holds and doesn't come out, and, instead, Leonard raises his arms like a man would to receive rather than to give.

"Yeah sweetheart, it's your daddy."

She stares for a moment, her eyes widening, but then she gets up on her tiny legs and totters over to his arms which lightly wrap around her as if she were made of feathers.

Something ugly grasps hold of Jocelyn then, when her daughter smiles happily at the man and plays with his hair. She is surprised, just slightly, to find the rotten mold of something long dead-_-hope-_-and the feeling is bitter and vengeful. _Betrayal._

Her bag is packed upstairs and before the cake is even cut she leaves out the front door.

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Beacon

His hands, strong hands that have flawlessly cut into and sealed up bodies countless times, are fumbling with the peanut butter and jelly halves. He isn't sure if she likes the crust or not so he cuts them off but leaves them on the plate.

The world works in funny ways, he reflects as he sits down by his daughter-ignoring the third, empty chair-and stretches a small smile across his face, feeling the rust flake and chafe on old, out of practice muscles that were still getting used to the movements. But he finds that the effort is only a little different from riding a bicycle that he hasn't ridden in years.

Jocelyn has been gone for two days.

He takes Joanna's little hand and walks her outside to the swing set that he had bought and built for her third birthday. He can't really remember the last time he saw the swing set in the daylight, the cheery colors too vivid and full for his eyes, but he lets Joanna lead him to it until she lets go of his hand and runs the final distance to the seat where she waits expectantly with the eager patience of an expert showing the new kid how to play.

"Push, just like that! Yay, push daddy! Push!"

She laughs so much and so freely that he is soon following, laughing with her, rust and all.

"Higher! Higher! _Higher!_"

He watches her fly into the sun.

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Teacher

There is a first for everything. He is a little bemused at the momentary silence and stuttering at the end of the comm line when he calls in sick for work that day, but he has enough sick days to make up a whole vacation so he doesn't mind it too much.

He knows that she would come back sooner rather than later. It was just one bag.

So he cleans up the kitchen and the rest of the house before setting about to cook breakfast.

_Where's mommy?_

He dabs a little chocolate syrup here and there to make a squiggly kind of smiley face on a pancake, and he sets the tables for two-her polka dot fork and plate and a mug for his coffee.

_"Silly daddy, this fork not that one."_

He tugs her hair into pigtails and buttons up her play dress and neatly tucks her little feet into her shoes. Her over packs her lunch bag and zips her coat up too far, but they walk hand in hand as she leads him to the bus stop where the other pairs of kids and adults are standing. The low murmuring comes to a blatant stop like someone had suddenly capped the top on a jar of bees, but Leonard had heard enough.

_Where's mommy?_

For the first time in a long while, he suddenly feels uncomfortably _young_. He is not among the streamlined halls of the hospital and the smooth traffic of more wrinkled faces than not nodding to him as they all fluidly pass each other like body cells in circulation.

He is here, suddenly aware of other mothers and fathers that are standing still with clam, cool sureness and the few hairs of grey on some make him think of his full head of mahogany.

He had never liked crowds all that much, so he stands awkwardly to the side while Joanna beams and waves to other children, swinging and tugging at his hand like he was a pole that she was hanging off of.

"Look! This my daddy!"

It gives the children, and the adults, free range to stare at Leonard who stiffly smiles and clumsily mutters a greeting. When the school bus arrives, he has never been more relieved to let go of her hand, and Joanna bounces into the door but quickly reappears at an open window.

"Remember daddy, pick up right here! I see you soon!"

The wobbly smile is abruptly back on Leonard's face as he nods and hesitates before giving her a small wave.

"No daddy, like this!"

She cups her hands over her mouth and puffs out her chest like something mighty before blowing him a kiss across her palms. He blinks then copies her and she grins.

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Habit

It is the dead of the night when the pager goes off-it is less than two seconds before he's ripping his coat off the floor.

_"McCoy! Emergency code delta! We need you!"_

The rest of the emergency's gruesome details shoot into his brain where it gets listed and analyzed with quick speed. His body slips into the familiar adrenaline rush of the midnight hour in which his surroundings are both hazy and fantastically clear.

_"Change to code 10! Repeat, code 10!"_

_Shit._

He's thundering down the steps, only vaguely registering the creak of a door opening-

-_"We need you McCoy!"_-

-prompting him to shout over his shoulder-

-"Joss, gotta go!"-

-and then he whips through the front door, the hinges swinging to and fro before stopping.

Headlights and the guttural noise of the car fade and the door remains open to the black, silent night.

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Love

_Remember daddy!_

It strikes him when he's resting on a waiting room sofa, and his head shoots up as a burst of sickening nausea and dread pours down his body like freezing water.

He doesn't stop running even once, not until he reaches the open door of the house, and then his keys drop at the edge next to an abandoned bag.

The small sound causes Jocelyn to jerk her teary face towards him, and he is standing there like a shell of himself that had been left behind in the dust.

She is still crying, her heart angrily bleeding from her face, and huddled in her arms-shaking with her on the floor-is her hiccuping daughter whose hazel eyes are large, wet, and stricken with fear.

Belatedly, he realizes that he doesn't know which name to say.

He starts to inch a foot forwards but stops.

"I just wanted-" Her breath hitches high into her throat, suddenly clawing back what would have been too much. "I just wanted to give you some time alone with her." She jams her quivering lips together as she squeezes everything inside.

His hands are gripping the doorway so tightly that his whole arm is shaking.

"...Joss..."

Her lips can't squeeze anymore and she bursts, mouth open and raw, and shuts her eyes instead as she buries her face into the top of her daughter's head. Joanna responds by hugging tighter, trying to bury herself into her mother's embrace.

Something wet slides down his cheeks and open mouth, and he cries and silently watches their forms blur into each other.

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Answer

He doesn't want to make excuses, but it doesn't stop Joanna from shyly coming around to make them for him.

_"It's okay daddy, you a doctor!"_

He bites and gnaws the inside of his cheeks until they're bloody sores, but he doesn't stop her either. Doesn't know if he should.

_"Daddy's a doctor! Saving a -bujillions ga-millions people! You're like superhero daddy!"_

Mostly, he's relieved when Jocelyn comes down to take Joanna up in her arms and go upstairs. Mostly.

Neither of them says a word when Jocelyn places a pillow and a neatly folded up blanket at the other end of the couch. She starts cooking breakfast and dinner for three and like clockwork they both sit down on either side of their daughter.

_"Are you staying daddy?"_

She starts leaving a note and a babysitter at times, and neither says anything when she comes home late at night, smelling like perfume mingled with cologne.

_"But what about the people daddy? What about the people you gotta save?"_

The silence is a solid, tangible thing. It is a blanket between them that hushes unnecessary words and softens the sharp corners. It is a peace offering. A caged olive branch that hangs between their eyes.

It is temporary.

_"Yeah? And where the -fuck- were you? Don't think that I'm not noticing how you've been creeping off to that Treadway of yours. God, you think that my head is stuck in the goddamn ground or somethin'?"_

_"You never listen to me, never have! Every single goddamn time I try to talk to you-! Oh, who the fuck are you kidding Leonard? All these years, all these fucking years, just waiting around for you-"_

_"-Everything I've done was for us! For our family! Fuck! I-I love you Joceyln. You and Jo are -everything-to me. You know that, you gotta know that!"_

_"...I've always loved you more. More than you could ever love me. I thought I could live with that, but I can't, not anymore."_

_"Joss-what are you saying?"_

_"You're gonna leave. You're gonna leave for good this time."_

The pieces lay scattered between them. Broken glass like crystals all around that bleed and refuse to crumble when either tries to step across.

The bills collect up again, the hours start to grow, and then one night when she leaves, she leaves the note, the babysitter, and a divorce file.

He is a stubborn man and does not relent. But, without fail, those three things always wait for him at the end of the night, just as equally motionless.

He doesn't notice how he starts to automatically reach for the bottle and glass come each night. The burn down his throat and stomach engulfs the aching one burning through his heart.

Then, one night, she adds a fourth thing.

A court notice and summons for a formal hearing that called for all relevant family members.

Him, Jocelyn, and Joanna.

_"Goddammit Jocelyn, why can't we just -talk- about this!"_

_"You're too late Leonard. A decade too late."_

He stays up the entire night with a bottle of whiskey, staring at the two files that lay side by side on the dining table.

Then, he startles and almost knocks his cup over, seeing Joanna's rumpled hair and the teddy bear in her arm as her hand rubs a sleepy eye.

_"Daddy? Whatcha doin' up so late? It's way past bed-time."_

_"Ssh, darlin', go back to sleep. It's all right. It'll be all right. Daddy's got you."_

Come the morning, he leaves his signature on one of them with a note of his own.

_Take care._

He leaves everything and leaves everything to them.

Everything was for them, after all.


	3. Starlight

Starlight

*  
Hold

He feels pretty damn bad about the kid's pants, warning or no, so he resolves himself to somehow make it up to the kid. But as soon as the shuttle touches the ground, he bumbles out of the safety harness and door faster than anybody else and retches up more bile than he had ever known the human body could hold. And he was a doctor.

He realizes that a hand is on his back and that another one is holding steady on his chest as if to hold him back from collapsing into his own pitiful puddle of vomit. In all honesty, it probably _was _the only thing holding him back from collapsing into his own pitiful puddle of vomit.

The hands help straighten him up and he's not too surprised to see the kid there with a real, honest-to-god look of concern.

_Goddammit_.

He's also not surprised to had spoken that out loud, but the kid woofs a small laugh-a short breath of air through the nose.

"Damn, Bones, you really are fucked up."

"More than you'll ever know." He mutters more to himself, but the kid quirks an eyebrow at him before hauling Leonard's arm over his shoulder and helping his shaky legs to actually move and walk. It doesn't help that the hangar is full of shuttles and the raucous noise of some flying overhead and some taking off-_well yeah, Bones, we -are- in a shuttle bay_-and that he was nursing a roaring headache and hangover.

Still, he's cognizant (enough) to realize that Jim Kirk was a helpful, if not annoying, little bastard.

_"Two pods in a shuttle hold, Bones. You can nickname me too, if you want, I'm down with anything from Captain Fine to Awesome Sauce."_

So he shuts up and leans on him.

*  
Habit

It would have been easier if the kid didn't lean on him too.

He thinks that it's all just a little bit fucked up.

It doesn't take Jim Kirk's genius to see the real hurt inside the kid. He was a father. Is. A crappy one, but one nonetheless. Even if he's half-asleep, muscle memory knows well enough how to open the door and silently wave the kid in. He brings the lights on to a low setting and starts boiling a cup of tea and forces the kid to suck it up and drink the "_nasty, herb shit" _because what he needed was warmth and comfort and not the cold sting of a sedative.

He doesn't say anything about the kid's need to wander into his apartment during the quietest hours of the night like an aimless dog in want of steadiness and security-like a child trying to leave a nightmare.

_"Y'couch more comfy."_

He gets out the spare blanket and pillow that he keeps close to the sofa and lays it across the kid who snuggles deeper into the cushions and relaxes into a deep sleep.

He wasn't sure if it was worse or not that the kid didn't really look a thing like her.

The resemblance leaned closer to her mother, ironically enough, but he sits by the couch anyway and glances at the sleeping figure curled up in on itself before walking back to his own bed.

He knows that, in the morning, the kid would be gone, blanket and pillow already neatly folded and put away in the closet, and that he would meet Jim later on in the day during lunch or a class break.

*  
Absence

He tries not to worry, and he tries not to take a sick comfort in worrying about someone else so that it helps distract him from brooding over a past filled with regret and hazel eyes just like his.

Eventually, he returns to his apartment and isn't surprised to find Jim already there; he's long given up making a fuss at the lack of courtesy involving access codes and forced entry. Jim is sitting at the kitchen counter and doesn't look up when he enters. There isn't a liquor glass in sight-nothing-the table is clean and bare, and he knows that Jim is angry.

"Took you a while." He finally says.

Leonard doesn't speak, but waits for Jim to continue.

The kid glances at him with a foreign coldness that makes his gut twist around and around because he's suddenly staring at hazel eyes, older and wiser, stabbing into him with the same bitterness.

"If you really love her, you'll see her. That's it. Plain and simple."

They're starting to tread into dangerous waters between them. Dark and murky and threatening to drown one or the both of them.

He does what he normally does and puts up fronts.

"That isn't your business, kid. Keep your damn nose out of what you don't belong in-much less even know about-"

"_Fuck _that _shit_, I know _plenty_ and I'm not your _fucking kid_ Bones. You got one already, so man up and be a fucking father to _her_, not _me_."

Jim's cutting honesty stuns Leonard into silence and the angry blue of Jim's eyes swarms into his gaze and makes him a little dizzy-_so familiar_-and then Jim glares at him darkly and they're both not quite sure about who or what they're talking about anymore.

"Parents don't fucking _leave_ their kid-_no - matter - what_-call it whatever the hell you want but it's called _abandonment_. It's that fucking simple."

Then, as if to further ground his point home, Jim stays.

He stays rooted to his seat, the roiling anger pouring out of him in waves-Leonard knows that _sore spot _is the understatement of the year when it comes to Jim and family-but Jim doesn't make a single move to leave or storm out of the room like one typically would see in a holo-drama.

Jim pinpoints Leonard down with a fierce-_desperate_-hold that dares him to be the one to leave first. And that pushes the envelope too damn far.

He slams a fist down on the counter and ill-formed hot words gush out like oozing glass from a fire-they're too revealing in how much Jim had struck home, center and point, with his piercing and relentless insight.

_"Shut-up. Shut the fuck up. You don't know-you can't know, you're too fucking young and you wouldn't-couldn't understand why I did what I had to do."_

He's gripping his head-it's going to explode-he doesn't realize that the salt is from his tears.

_"Everything I did was for them-for her-everything."_

"You know, you should really come up with a better excuse."

The calm of Jim's voice picks him up in a cool wave, and, when it draws back, he can stand up and breathe less harshly.

Jim's receded, looking at a wall at something far, far away, withdrawn and distant. But Leonard knows both Jim and the smolder of old anguish very well.

"It's Christmas man, fuck the old lady and comm or send something anyway. She deserves that much. At least you would have tried then, right?"

A tired sigh. "I already said that she won't let me-"

"Fuck the pity act Bones, your kid can't really do anything, so you gotta try twice as hard for both you and her." His mouth catches, as if debating over whether to speak the next words or not. Jim sets his mouth in a line and continues with a heady voice.

"Believe me Bones, just the fact that you tried, really tried-_kept trying_-it's gonna make a world of difference to her, trust me."

* * *

A week later, when Jim is less smug-disgustingly smug and all but crowing _I tooold you so_-Leonard unceremoniously dumps a mountain of dirty laundry on Jim's head when he's lounging away on the couch. He flings the laundry basket at Jim for good measure and snipes-_not your goddamn mom for fuck's sake-_but he still discreetly checks Jim's reaction.

Jim laughs and snaps one of his briefs like a rubber band at Leonard's head-he barely ducks-before chuckling out, "Pssh, I figured that out a _long _time ago, get with the program Bones."

And then Jim hacks it so that they both begin the new year in a spacious double meant for married couples-_not your goddamn wife either!_-and while the incorrigible bastard proceeds to hook an arm around his neck and parade them down the apartment hallway to the curious eyes of the other residents, Leonard can't really get riled up enough to slap Jim's arm down.

It was a pretty damn nice apartment after all.

*  
Beacon

_"Will you dance with me?"_

He's not stupid.

He knows, and admits, that he used to be. Stupid in love. Stupid in marriage. Stupid.

_"I'm pregnant."_

But he's better than that now. He knows.

_"Higher! Higher! -Higher-!"_

It took him a while, but shame on him if he makes the same mistake again.

So it momentarily blindsides him when he's not-not making the same mistake but seeing the inevitable fall of someone else and, by god, turnabout was a smug little _bitch._

_"I'm in love with you."_

He won't lie. Jim dazzles him. He's bold and courageous with a brilliant mind surpassed by few. He is glorious-his eyes are bright and shining and always looking ahead to the next challenge-he is on his way to the mountain top-the sun is pure white and streaming around him, making him glow like a goddamn god.

He is young and in love for the first time. He's making a mistake.

Or rather, Leonard is going to be the one making the mistake if he gives into the exhilarating temptation to recklessly take Jim's hand.

_"I'm in love with you."_

_"My darling, until the end of time."_

He forces himself to jerk away and ignore the hurt look in Jim's eyes. They are Captain and CMO, they are 'bestest friends 'til the end', they are Jim and Bones. They are and there is nothing else beyond.

He's not stupid.

_"Bullshit. That's -bullshit-. Don't fucking lie to me Bones, you -know-me and I know -you-."_

The tremor begins in his chest and curls into his voice no matter how hard he tries to keep it down, and it comes out so painfully raw and bleeding-_heartbroken_-that, for once, Jim is shocked into dumb silence for the first time.

_"Yeah, hah, yeah, I love you. But guess what kid? I'll always love you more."_

_More than you could ever love me._

Jim leaves this time.

*  
Precipice

They don't say anything.

Which is odd because Jim's normal move is to face any problem head-on and immediately. He blazes through the obstacles to reach his goal, to reach the end. He's aggressive. He always makes the first move.

Jim leaves him alone.

When they meet by chance in the halls or when they have to talk, Jim is polite and quiet. Leonard knows him enough to see the nervousness flickering around the edges like shadows, but, for the most part, Jim is considerate and downright professional.

It is almost as insufferable as if Jim were to pretend that nothing had happened.

Good.

They will get over this, like they usually do. They will move on, because they're not a couple of adolescents playing a skittish game of ignorance.

So, has Spock beaten him yet? Not a chance, but he's getting closer; Jim's not the all-time chess champion for nothing.

How's Joanna? Growing like a weed and growing even more beautiful. He's going to have to beat off the boys with a ship armed with phasers at this point.

And how was the missus? Just fine, he says, just fine.

Is that so.

The comm message comes at a surprise and the wedding invitation is an even bigger one. There is a silent moment where they stare at each other through the screen. Past years seem to fly across and soundlessly echo from their faces and, at that moment, somehow, all the light years of space between them had been suddenly compressed down into a small gap.

The silence stretches on and on and then finally, everything breaks with a small snap.

"Joss, how are you doing?"

The glass had crumbled long ago

"Len, I'm doing just fine, how are you doing over there?"

and nothing but the clearest of sand blew away in the breeze.

"Honest Joss? I'd never thought I'd say this, but that karma shit is real. And it sucks. Big-time."

* * *

He can't remember the last time he saw her laugh like that and it's probably a complete first when both Joanna and her mother are talking to Leonard at the same time through the comm link. But after a while, Jocelyn shoos Joanna off to bed, and the two face each other once more.

She speaks first.

"Leonard, I know this is gonna sound awful crazy, but even if you know the end, even if you know that it's all gonna lead to a world of hurt, you still gotta try. You gotta reach out and take his hand anyway."

He pauses, the bewilderment building up in his face, and the choked up words trickle then start to fall like marbles.

"But, _why?_I know how it's all gonna turn out. I know, dammit, been on the other end of it! Why? Why the hell would I do that when I know, deep down somewhere, no matter what kind of foolish delusion I trick myself into-how can I keep going knowing that he's gonna leave me?"

He's startled at himself, a short pause, but then he laughs, bitter and broken and unbelieving.

"It's a goddamn no-win scenario."

Jocelyn is silent for a moment, considering, then her face ripples and she's smiling. He breathes in sharply. She's smiling at him. The same sorrow-filled, cracked smile he saw all those years ago behind a dusty old holovid recorder, and the image of a vast, empty field of grass flashes in his mind.

"Oh, Len," she whispers, and a slow, single tear falls. "You know that you're going to walk right beside him, no matter what, because that's all you can do. It's all you can do."

The grass field sways, still empty and barren save for the sound of the rolling wind.

And then he understands.

*  
Love

He expected Jim to either crack and explode all at once or continue on his slow, weary path of delicately mending over unsaid words and arguments.

Jim Kirk? Delicate? Leonard knew where his money was going.

But he is still fooled when his door chimes during the quietest part of night and Leonard opens it and silently waves Jim in, bringing the lights on to low.

Jim has a canteen in his hand and he pours them both a cup of warm tea and he sits down on one end of the small couch in Leonard's quarters, motioning for him to take the opposite end.

They sit for a while like that, letting the warmth of the mugs spread through their hands. Neither drinks.

Finally, Jim stops staring deeply into the contents of the mug, and he looks straight ahead instead.

"Bones...I'm not going to lie. You're probably right. You're always right about shit like that."

Jim sighs then, the sound like a shuddering hand trying to hold together something broken.

"But I'm pretty fucking head over heels for you and I'm pretty damn sure that I'd rather die than leave you. Ever. That's the honest truth."

Leonard had the insane urge just then to gutter out a cliche as hell ultimatum just for the shits and giggles-_Me or the ship Jim! Choose!_-but the holo-drama moment passed, and he was left with warm hands and hollow insides.

In the end, they turn their heads to look at each other and they fall against each other like jagged pieces of puzzles trying to crumple together and find and smooth all the empty fractures and fissures until they ran like continuous grooves that no longer minded the touch.

_I love you._

Jim is holding his face, their noses just meeting but nothing else. The heat from Jim's warm, warm hands are spreading into his skin and Jim is looking at him, into him, pouring himself into Leonard. If blue eyes once like a sky were now hauntingly beautiful starlight, he doesn't mind that much.

In fact, as he stares into Jim's eyes-Jim, standing there with a cool breeze playing with his hair, the stars in the night sky behind him playing servants to the starry blue of Jim's eyes-Jim, holding his hands and smiling as he nods towards the mountaintop where the soft glow of a bright star awaited-he doesn't mind that much at all. Not a bit.

_It's all that you can do._

_"Will you dance with me?"_

* * *

Comments and critiques are welcome. :)


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